Pope Leo XIII
Gioacchino Pecci
20.II.1878 - 20.VII.1903
VATICAN LINK - to his Encyclicals, Apostolic Letters, etc.
Posted on 06/13/2007 5:55:00 AM PDT by NYer
This article first appeared in the June 2007 issue of Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture.
VATICAN LINK - to his Encyclicals, Apostolic Letters, etc.
VATICAN LINK - to his Encyclicals, Apostolic Letters, etc.
What a wise man.
Bomb the Vatican!! Let's invade!! Nuke 'em!!
Hey Leo.........we got freedom, buddy. Take care of your altar boys, instead!!
**Standard Freeper "Macro" for replies to Catholic criticism of America. Available on request by Freepmail.
And that's also a summary of the "Americanism" heresy.
Great article and a great encyclical.
Good thing you added that last sentence. :)
D’accord, mon ami!
I wonder if the publishers of this magazine have the same solicitude for Catholic Mexican Mestizos that they do for moslem Arabs?
And lest anyone think that my criticisms make me an apologist for modernism, please allow me to say that the implication of the remark about the "unjust war" hurts an otherwise worthy article that makes excellent points against the idea of the "true religion" constantly progressing and "improving" over time.
It is a depressing, traitorous "palaeoconservative" rag edited by the most pompous ass in American journalism.
Thomas Fleming's only competition on the egometer is that wanker who used to run Harper's - Lewis Lapham.
And, not surprisingly, their politics have converged over the years.
The Catholicism that makes its pages from time to time savors of schism: one of the people at the top of Chronicles' enemies list is Richard John Neuhaus of First Things.
So Americanism is just ignoring/disobeying certain parts of official Church teaching based on personal preferences and motivated by a mistaken idea of liberty? Americanism can be any heresy as long as it is professed to be motivated by liberty?
Freegards
Bottom line....
Individualism is killing America
Socialism is killing Europe
Islam is killing everything
I think one of the difficulties in defining or combatting heresy was the point you just made, “Americanism can be any heresy.” Most heresies have a leader (the heresiarch) and a formulated statement, but Americanism was more a tendency than anything else, and hence very difficult to either identify or combat.
Some people, such as Isaac Hecker, founder of the Paulists, were unfairly tagged “Americanists” simply for wanting to do things that they thought would bring the Gospel to Americans in a way that standard European approaches could not. The Paulists were very devoted to street preaching, for example. Once upon a time, Catholic preachers had roamed Europe, but in 19th century European Catholicism, this was unheard of.
So I would say yes, that if you had to define the essence of Americanism, it is a belief in some sort of totally unbound, unattached “individual conscience” that is free to decide upon moral laws depending on whether the individual finds the following of those laws to be to his taste and convenience or not. Americanism is much less a theological heresy, such as Arianism, for example, or some heresy dealing with the Trinity, and instead is a sort of “practical heresy” relating to the moral field. But it is still difficult to define because it has no leading proponent. (Of course, nowadays, after Vatican II, which in some ways paved the way for the full flowering of Americanism throughout the Church, it’s probably harder to find someone who ISN’T an Americanist!)
Well it seems to me that lots of heresies had this idea at their root way before Catholics were in America. All men had/have liberty as an inalienable right, whether their gubberments recognized this or not — and it seems like it was a shame that the first nation to really get behind this idea was singled out to be the name of a heresy that can basically be boiled down to something as simple as meaning the sin of someone disobeying official Church teaching because they feel like it.
I might be taking this too harshly, and I’m definitely no expert in Church doctrine. It would just hit me the wrong way if sombody said “John Kerry!! What a heretic—he’s such an American.” I mean come on!!
Freegards
And apparantly a Grade A crank who should read the Encyclical on which he wishes to comment - and base his comments solely on quotations from it.
The Encyclical in question condemns watering down doctrine to make it acceptable to converts. It does NOT deal with forms of government as the usual pinheads always attempt to assert.
To make my point, here are excerpts from another Encyclical by Pope Leo XIII:
LONGINQUE OCEANI
ON CATHOLICITY IN THE UNITED STATES
ENCYCLICAL OF HIS HOLINESS POPE LEO XIII, JANUARY 6, 1895
4. Nor, perchance did the fact which We now recall take place without some design of divine Providence. Precisely at the epoch when the American colonies, having, with Catholic aid, achieved liberty and independence, coalesced into a constitutional Republic the ecclesiastical hierarchy was happily established amongst you; and at the very time when the popular suffrage placed the great Washington at the helm of the Republic, the first bishop was set by apostolic authority over the American Church. The well-known friendship and familiar intercourse which subsisted between these two men seems to be an evidence that the United States ought to be conjoined in concord and amity with the Catholic Church. And not without cause; for without morality the State cannot endure -- a truth which that illustrious citizen of yours, whom We have just mentioned, with a keenness of insight worthy of his genius and statesmanship perceived and proclaimed. But the best and strongest support of morality is religion. She, by her very nature, guards and defends all the principles on which duties are founded, and setting before us the motives most powerful to influence us, commands us to live virtuously, and forbids us to transgress. Now what is the Church other than a legitimate society, founded bv the will and ordinance of Jesus Christ for the preservation of morality and the defence of religion? For this reason have We repeatedly endeavored, from the summit of the pontifical dignity, to inculcate that the Church, whilst directly and immediately aiming at the salvation of souls and the beatitude which is to be attained in heaven, is yet, even in the order of temporal things, the fountain of blessings so numerous and great that they could not have been greater or more numerous had the original purpose of her institution been the pursuit of happiness during the life which is spent on earth.
5. That your Republic is progressing and developing by giant strides is patent to all; and this holds good in religious matters also. For even as your cities. in the course of one century, have made a marvelous increase in wealth and power, so do we behold the Church, from scant and slender beginnings, grown with rapidity to be great and exceedingly flourishing. Now if, on the one hand, the increased riches and resources of your cities are justly attributed to the talents and active industry of the American people, on the other hand, the prosperous condition of Catholicity must be ascribed, first indeed, to the virtue, the ability, and the prudence of the bishops and clergy; but in so slight measure also, to the faith and generosity of the Catholic laity.
CONCERNING NEW OPINIONS, VIRTUE, NATURE AND GRACE, WITH REGARD TO AMERICANISM
Encyclical of Pope Leo XIII promulgated on January 22, 1899.
"Finally, not to delay too long, it is stated that the way and method hitherto in use among Catholics for bringing back those who have fallen away from the Church should be left aside and another one chosen, in which matter it will suffice to note that it is not the part of prudence to neglect that which antiquity in its long experience has approved and which is also taught by apostolic authority. The scriptures teach us that it is the duty of all to be solicitous for the salvation of one's neighbor, according to the power and position of each. The faithful do this by religiously discharging the duties of their state of life, by the uprightness of their conduct, by their works of Christian charity and by earnest and continuous prayer to God. On the other hand, those who belong to the clergy should do this by an enlightened fulfillment of their preaching ministry, by the pomp and splendor of ceremonies especially by setting forth that sound form of doctrine which Saint Paul inculcated upon Titus and Timothy. But if, among the different ways of preaching the word of God that one sometimes seems to be preferable, which directed to non-Catholics, not in churches, but in some suitable place, in such wise that controversy is not sought, but friendly conference, such a method is certainly without fault. But let those who undertake such ministry be set apart by the authority of the bishops and let them be men whose science and virtue has been previously ascertained. For we think that there are many in your country who are separated from Catholic truth more by ignorance than by ill-will, who might perchance more easily be drawn to the one fold of Christ if this truth be set forth to them in a friendly and familiar way."
"From the foregoing it is manifest, beloved son, that we are not able to give approval to those views which, in their collective sense, are called by some "Americanism." But if by this name are to be understood certain endowments of mind which belong to the American people, just as other characteristics belong to various other nations, and if, moreover, by it is designated your political condition and the laws and customs by which you are governed, there is no reason to take exception to the name. But if this is to be so understood that the doctrines which have been adverted to above are not only indicated, but exalted, there can be no manner of doubt that our venerable brethren, the bishops of America, would be the first to repudiate and condemn it as being most injurious to themselves and to their country. For it would give rise to the suspicion that there are among you some who conceive and would have the Church in America to be different from what it is in the rest of the world."
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